From talk of going into an immediate return fight with Daniel Dubois, to returning to action next summer. This is where we are with former two-time heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua. AJ, as all fans know, was quite brutally KO’d by Dubois in September, and the word was Joshua was “desperate for revenge.” And we listened as Eddie Hearn told us Joshua may go straight back in with Dubois, the IBF heavyweight champ, in a February rematch.
But after deciding against this due to a niggling injury or two that Joshua picked up in the Wembley defeat, Joshua will now sit it out and see what happens in the Oleksandr Usyk-Tyson Fury rematch. Hearn argues how so many people still want to see Joshua and Fury fight, this regardless of whether or not Fury gets his own revenge when he fights Usyk again in December. Maybe. But who will Joshua fight next if it’s not Fury? If it’s not Dubois?
Hearn, speaking on DAZN, said Joshua’s next fight could indeed be the Dubois rematch, but later on in 2025.
“It could be the Dubois rematch but it won’t be on February 22nd,” Hearn said of Joshua’s next move. “I think we have to see how December 21st unfolds (the Usyk-Fury rematch) and then make a decision after that. Expect to see AJ in a ring next May or June.”
If it’s June when Joshua returns, he will have been out for nine months, and the clock is ticking on Joshua’s career at age 35. The Fury fight may still be a big one, but what if Joshua gets it and loses, by knockout? How would another loss, a fifth loss, affect Joshua’s legacy? Also, if Joshua does not avenge his loss to Dubois, or if he doesn’t even try to do so, how would that affect his career credentials?
Joshua may not have too many fights left, at all, and some people do feel he is already finished. June is a long time for us to wait until we find out what, if anything, Joshua still has to offer. Hearn has said more than once that Joshua will fight either Fury or Dubois next, nobody else. But can Joshua defeat either man? Again, we will have to wait a good few months to find out. That’s if either fight actually happens…….
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